Cultural Crossovers

The newer generation in storied companies is unafraid of introducing new ways of running the business.  And it’s yielding favourable results too

- Varsha Meghani

When Anant Goenka rejoined Ceat in 2010—fresh offhis MBA and a stint at KEC, his family’s power transmission business—the tyremaker had just come out of a rough patch. Sales were finally recovering, high costs were kept in check and the outsourcing business was given a new fillip. “The aspect of survival was over,” recalls Anant, 37, who took over as managing director in 2012. “My predecessor had made some important investments [a greenfield plant and an R&D facility] to take us into the next phase of growth.”

With its freshly found financial footing, Ceat, part of the RPG Group, set up by Anant’s grandfather Rama Prasad Goenka in 1979, would seem an odd candidate for a dramatic cultural overhaul. Yet, that is exactly what the third generation scion did.

Or take the case of Nalli, the ninedecade-old, privately held business synonymous with Kanjeevaram silk sarees. “We’ve always had a culture of operational excellence and entrepreneurship,” says Lavanya Nalli, 34, the founder’s great-great granddaughter. After spending six years away from the business—at Harvard University, McKinsey, and Myntra—she was able to see the hurdles that were holding Nalli back from exponential growth.

In the case of Arvind Ltd too, Sanjay Lalbhai’s sons Punit, 36, and Kulin, 32, entered the business about a decade ago and wanted to move from “being a traditional textiles company to a technology company”, which would require certain processes to be put in place. “It wasn’t so much of a departure from the old way of working,” clarifies Kulin, the fifth generation at the company. “My father grew the business from a denim mill to a textiles conglomerate. So that culture of innovation and creativity has always been there. We’re just enhancing and building on it.”